Today's Tasty Friday recipe contains one of my favorite things - pesto! Check out this recipe for slow cooker chicken pesto from the book The Paleo Slow Cooker: Healthy, Gluten-free Meals the Easy Way by Arsy of Rubies and Radishes.
Ingredients
2 lbs skinless chicken thighs
1 tbsp ghee
[Additional ¼ tsp sea salt to be added just before the end of cooking]
PESTO
1 cup flat leaf parsley
2 cups fresh basil
4 cloves garlic
½ cup olive oil
¼ cup macadamia nuts
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 tsp fresh oregano
¼ tsp sea salt
¼ tsp pepper
Cooking Instructions
› To make the pesto, combine all the ingredients (except the chicken and ghee, of course) in a food processor and blend.
› Melt the ghee in a heavy-bottomed pan over medium heat and brown the chicken on all sides for about 5 minutes. If you are cooking for immediate use, transfer the chicken to the slow cooker and pour the pesto over it.
› If you are cooking for later use, transfer the chicken to a bowl, pour pesto over it, cover and refrigerate.
› Place in slow cooker, then cook on low for 5½ hours.
› Sprinkle the additional sea salt over the chicken and cook for another ½ hour, then serve.
› I often reduce any extra sauce in the stove top pan over medium low heat for 5 to 10 minutes to give it extra flavor before pouring it over the chicken.
SERVINGS: 4
More about the Race Point cook book:
The Paleo diet has been the latest health movement, taking the low carb diet a step further by eliminating grains and legumes and eating only lean, grass-fed meat. In short they consume only what was available to ancient humans or cavemen. The theory says that by eating what human bodies were designed to eat, people will be healthier, have fewer illnesses and lose weight. In many cases, Paleo diet consumers are also fueling their P90X or Cross Fit exercise routines, the two most popular fitness regimes in the country. The health benefits have been supported by major studies. This is a popular trend much like the low carb diet. It is combined with the great bookselling topic of slow cooking. While the cavemen didn’t have slow cookers, they certainly used slow cooking techniques over fires which make the meals in this book one step closer to the origins and theory behind the diet. The delicious dishes are as homey as they are healthy—and ready when you are.
Arsy Vartanian (Santa Cruz, CA) is a foodie and Paleo diet success story herself. Her blog Rubies and Radishes (formerly 30 Days of Paleo) features tasty and inventive meals for those Paleo obsessed. She is also doing Cross Fit like many of her fellow Paleo dieters.
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